Heaven forbid they should just pass the legislation in a timely way. Now they send out letters telling you what they think they're going to pass. Great job, guys.

I'd hate to be the commissioner of internal revenue. Having to administer a system created by immature children is never any fun. Especially when the children never learn, but just get more and more unruly every year.

Comments (6)

I think it is even worse than Jack states.

The "fix" involved is with the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). The AMT was never indexed, and so unless it is modified it will include tens of thousands of tax payer who were never intended to be in AMT.

The Congress adjusts it every year to correct for this. The reason they will not do a permanent fix is that the reduced revenues will be used to compute future deficits, and by not making a permanent fix they make the deficits look smaller then they actually will be. In less polite circles this is called lying.

Another point. It was just released that the President's deficit reduction panel wants to reduce the top marginal tax rate to 23%, the top corporate rate to 26% and that this will substantially increase revenes and bring the budget in balance (except for interest) by 2015. Their apparent reasoning is that they will correct for the lower rates by eliinating tax preferences. Of course this will also cause the tax burdent to shift to middle income taxpayers, but hey,if you don't like it go start your own 501(c)(4) company and donate a couple of hundred million dollars to defeat it. Remember: no disclosure required.

well, this is a little progress. But rather than the Federal Reserve print money in hyper quantities, it would behoove the country instead to just keep the Bush tax cuts in place so we aren't left continuing to guess how Congress might intervene regarding next year's income tax rates and estate tax rates.

Heck Congress is so dysfunctional it didn't even bother putting together a federal budget this year, which is the first time since 1973.

Re: "I'd hate to be the commissioner of internal revenue. Having to administer a system created by immature children is never any fun. Especially when the children never learn, but just get more and more unruly every year."

It's only public money, one function of which has become a funding mechanism for a degenerate form of publicly owned elections:

"The memo predicts that lawmakers will extend the Bush-era tax cuts for at least a year...."

Regarding the Executive Branch:

"The memo contains sharp words for President Obama, saying he will be 'under pressure to reach beyond the Congress and appeal directly to the American people for support - something he has not done very successfully in the last two years.'

The bank's chief executive, Jamie Dimon, was a strong supporter of Obama's candidacy in 2008 but has since led the bank's shift toward the GOP. 'We were neither in love nor have we fallen out,' Dimon told Fortune magazine in September, referring to Obama. '. . . He may have close relations, but I am not one of them.'"

As to matters involving the judiciary, JPM does not venture a prediction regarding outcomes in several potentially expensive actions brought against it. In the vexing matter of the theft of WaMu, JPM is now feuding rather than colluding with the FDIC's Sheila Bair:

Road Work

Miles run year to date: 113
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Total run in 2016: 155
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In 2008: 28
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In 2003: 269